Comments on: That Annoying New Verb “disrespect”

By: Csprrr

Csprrr — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 18:56:47 +0000

I don’t see how this word being 300 years old, makes it anymore useful, worthy of existence or less ugly.

Old age is no excuse.

By: Brad K.

Brad K. — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 15:32:04 +0000

Pamela, And here I was thinking that the well versed person would leverage their team’s strengths to vie with their opponent in a vigorous and sportsmanlike manner.

Now I find one verses them.

(I hate verbing leverage, etc.)

But just think of the wondrous scope of language just beginning to open up. Not only have national news channels grown from three (3) or four (4) in the last forty (40) years, but with computers synthesizing speech, I imagine that allowing the verbing of all kinds of words will result is a plethora of dialects and new word usages. Next thing will be unrestrained nouning, I guess.

(Is the practice of using the number words, followed by the digits form in parentheses, an early form of HTML ALT text?)

By: Pamela

Pamela — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 13:07:42 +0000

An example that immediately came to mind when I read this post (and the one on “a few stuff” – eek!) was the new use of “versed” – as in when talking about a game (for example, England vs. Australia) you sometimes hear particularly children and teens talking about who “versed” whom or who were they “versing”. I recently heard my 6 year old nephew talk about a team he “versed” at school. It may be a local thing but I hope it doesn’t catch on!

By: Stella

Stella — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 21:32:59 +0000

Well, all words are despicable neologisms at some time or other in history. I guess the longer it’s been around, the more respect it gets – a linguistic version of ‘respect the elderly’. Or, conversely, ‘disrespect the young’.

By: Deborah H

Deborah H — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 20:43:19 +0000

“Disrespect(ed)” as a verb clangs in my ears, but “dissed” (can we call “dissed” a back formation?) doesn’t bother me. “My bad” is useful, too, especially when accompanied with the tapping-the-chest hand gesture of apology.

It may be street slang, but it’s pure communication.